First shipload of turbine parts for state’s biggest wind farm arrives at world’s largest coal port

The first shipment of turbine tower parts for Squadron Energy’s huge Uungala wind farm has arrived at the Port of Newcastle, one of the world’s largest coal export ports, in preparation for installation of the first of the project’s 69 turbines.

The 414 megawatt (MW) Uungala wind farm near Wellington in central west NSW will be the largest in the state, once complete – until others such as the massive, recently approved 1.45 gigawatt (GW) Yanco Delta project is built.

Squadron Energy, controlled by iron ore billionaire and green energy evangelist Andrew Forrest, said in a LinkedIn post on Friday that the turbine tower sections would be stored at the port before being transported to site later this year, with installations scheduled to start early next year.

“The Port of Newcastle’s state-of-the-art storage facilities means our components will be well-looked after until we’re ready for them to make the journey from Newcastle to the site,” said Squadron Energy executive general manager development and delivery Tony Clark in a statement.

Squadron says the 126 tower sections spent eight days at sea before arriving at Newcastle, with the next shipment expected from next month. The parts range in length from 10 to 29 metres long.

The turbine tower components will be delivered to the Uungala site via more than 700 oversize overmass deliveries under police escort, which will take place over a 12-month period.

“We’re powering through work on site and can’t wait to start erecting the first turbine early next year, getting one step closer to generating clean energy through our 414MW project,” Clark says.

Port of Newcastle says having specialist storage available onsite minimises double handling and reduces unnecessary transport movements, benefiting both customer and regional communities.

“As the preferred gateway for 77 per cent of all renewable energy projects in NSW, we’re proud to play a central role in advancing the state’s clean energy transformation,” Port of Newcastle said in a separate LinkedIn post.

“The [Uungala] shipment is the first of up to 30,000 wind farm components expected to pass through the port over the next decade, highlighting our unrivalled capabilities for handling large-scale renewable energy projects.”

“Nobody has every undertaken such a complex freight task,” said Port of Newcastle CEO Craig Carmody in the PoN video on LinkedIn. “And we sit in the centre of it.

“These [wind farm component] imports are a perfect example of the diversification that the port has been pursuing,” Carmody said.

Squadron Energy first broke ground on Uungala wind farm in January 2024, after emerging as one of the winners in the $4.2 billion NSW government tender, the results of which were announced in December 2023.

The huge project has an energy off-take agreement with Snowy Hydro and approved connection to the grid.